


Wings for the Dove

by SolvableIllusion



Category: Ori and the Blind Forest
Genre: My First Fanfic, soft child go fast
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-16
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:14:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23685253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SolvableIllusion/pseuds/SolvableIllusion
Summary: In which I take a lovable, innocent child and turn them into an speed demon, because let's face it. We'd all be like that if we could move like Ori does.
Comments: 17
Kudos: 58





	1. Jump

**Author's Note:**

> OK! Here we go!  
> This is my first time putting up a fic I haven't scrapped before I worked up the will to put it up, so all constructive criticism is super appreciated.  
> Originally I was writing Ori and Sein as gender-ambiguous and genderless respectively using they/them pronouns, but halfway into the second chapter that ended up feeling like a mess whenever I had to refer to both characters in the same sentence multiple times. From what I've seen, male Ori is a significantly more common interpretation of the character than female Ori, so that's what I went with. Hopefully that's not too big of a deal.  
> With that said, I'll see you at the ending notes! Wouldn't want to front-load all the optional stuff, would we now?

“ _There were those that turned to hope…_ ”

Ori gingerly made his way over to the tree at the end of the cave, not sure how to process the sight of one of his brethren perishing at the hands of exhaustion, even if it was just a vision of a memory.

…It wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen before, he supposed.

Then again, that’s what scared him the most, if anything.

“... _when she ravaged and killed._ ” 

…Brethren.

It took a moment to register that they even were related. 

Ori slowly circled around the memory of his fallen relative. It was almost like staring into a lake on a warm summer day with Naru and seeing his own reflection, the noontide sun casting glare onto the little ripples on the water’s surface, the cool water providing reprieve from the harsh sunlight.

Even so, it was Ori’s first time “meeting” one of his kind. He took a brief moment to wonder what they were like. Did they love the Spirit Tree the same way Ori loved Naru? Were they on good terms with their siblings? Could they have been… friends, in another lifetime?

A movement in the corner of Ori’s eye pulled him out of his thoughts. Sein buzzed around the tree, seemingly bathing in the shimmering light pouring out of the bright orb perched on the tree’s center. Ori could’ve mistaken it for a miniature version of the Spirit Tree if he didn’t know better. 

“The light of the Spirit Tree lives in all of us. He’s the reason we’re alive, he’s the reason we grew. When he called out to you, many years past… we were attacked, wounded, and killed by our foe.”

Ori shivered a little. As naïve as it was at this moment, he thought back to his hopes of living a long, peaceful life with his mama. No… he couldn’t think about that now. With a shake of his head, ears wildly flopping about, he returned his attention to Sein. 

“Now these Ancestral Trees are all that’s left behind. Come closer now and feel the light of Fil, the spirit inside.”

Fil… so that was their name. Ori gently rolled it around on his tongue, getting the feel of the name… Fil. It was a nice name, he decided. 

With that out of the way, Ori softly padded over to Fil’s Ancestral Tree, feeling the soft grass surrounding the tree under his hooves. Even getting close to the tree felt good. The warm embrace of dancing light, the tree’s enchanting glow, the sweet smell of bark, and the beautiful array of white flowers under Ori’s feet drew him in. 

Ori gently laid his paws on Fil’s bark, admiring the elaborate swirls and patterns adorning the tree. Running his hand over some of the swirls, he was surprised by how smooth and pleasant the tree bark felt. 

A burst of light crackled to life above Ori, causing him to jump back in surprise. Suddenly, an unseen force lifted him into the air, enveloping the spirit with brilliant light. A lesser creature could have been blinded by the sight.

If Ori had been asked to pinpoint the sensation, he would’ve told you that it was closest to the warm, tender embrace of someone who hasn’t seen you in the longest time, and is all too excited to catch up with you. Fil’s memories flashed through his head, giving him glimpses of the power Fil held in their grasp.

  


As Ori snapped back to reality, he felt a burning need to get moving, eating him up inside, like rushing flood waters that can’t be dammed for much longer. With a burst of speed, Ori leapt for the nearest wall and started to clamber up the rough, earthy surface at breakneck pace. To Ori’s complete surprise, his paws already knew the best spots to grasp onto and the steadiest footholds to leap off of. Fil’s light had literally burned new muscle memory into his fibers. Ori hummed a little at this new realization.

Seeing the top, Ori put all his strength into one final push and jumped up, cleanly snagging the ledge with an outstretched paw. Lifting himself up, Ori vaulted over the ledge with supreme ease.

“Aw yeah! That was… that was awesome!” he cried, pumping a balled fist up as a rush of adrenaline surged through his body.

“Geez, Ori! What’s got you in such a rush?” Sein squeaked, trailing up behind him. 

“Hm?” Ori turned around, sheepishly rubbing his head. “Oh, sorry, Sein. I just feel so… energized! It’s amazing! I just have to move around, you know?”

“Well, I wouldn’t, considering this is all I have for a body,” Sein quipped. “But I suppose I do understand. Now, let’s get out of this cave, alright? We’ve yet to meet the Spirit Tree, and I don’t want to take too much longer.”

“Alright, alright.” Ori quickly snagged the radiant blue Energy Cell lying in wait on the secluded ledge the pair found themselves on before turning towards the wall he clung to to get here. “Let’s see if Fil helps me get this one right too.” 

Hopping off the edge, Ori stretched his paws out to create friction between him and the wall, slowing his rapid descent. “Riiiiiight… there!”

Ori pushed off the wall with every one of his limbs, bounding towards Fil’s tree. At the peak of his jump, Ori grasped at a branch and used his speed to swing himself up. With just enough angular momentum, he tucked his legs in for a backflip. 

The world seemed to move in slow motion as Ori spun through the air, heart pounding like mad. All he saw was the fur on his legs and the earthen ceiling in his peripherals. For a moment, Ori questioned if he would stick the landing. But Ori trusted in Fil’s instincts, and he trusted in himself. 

Dust flew around as two hooves slammed into the ground, barely remaining upright. Ori’s heart hammered through his chest like crazy as it took time for him to register that he did in fact stick the landing. Spreading his arms out like a bird flaunting its wingspan, Ori checked for any injuries. Nothing.

“I’m not even going to bother asking,” Sein groaned. “Just don’t make this a regular thing.”

Ori just grinned tooth to tooth. “No promises.”

Before leaving, Ori turned to the now dimly-glowing tree Fil had left behind. Instinct compelled a deep, respectful bow out of him. “Thank you, Fil,” Ori's voice wavered a little, recalling the vision they had seen earlier. “I wish we could’ve been friends, and I hope you rest in peace.”

With that, the pair turned away from the tree, leaving Ori to excitedly scamper up the cavern’s walls. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK OK OK! Thanks for sticking around! Again, all constructive criticism is super appreciated.  
> So first things first, I chose not to gender Fil because I'm not even sure if the game gives them a gender. At the very least, Ori would not have heard their gender at this point, because Sein doesn't mention it in the lead-up speech before Ori grabs their power. If there's no official gender and I feel I have to choose, I guess I'll gender them female, since their name just reminds me of Filia(Skullgirls), and by extension, Millia(Guilty Gear). Which is pretty funny, because both of those characters are built around moving around really fast.  
> Next: Yes, the titles are all going to be music references, because Hirohiko Araki has infected me. (Those who know, know.)  
> The fic name might be harder to catch, so I'll just put it out there: it's a reference to a Guns n' Roses lyric that is itself a reference to the 1971 movie The Vanishing Point(which I've never watched, but I intend to ASAP). I think it's very fitting given the context of the entire line, especially seeing as doves symbolize peace, which is perfect for Ori's character(even if they get a little more violent next game, haha).  
> Meanwhile, I think the chapter name should be pretty apparent. It's hard to imagine not ever having heard that famous opening riff at least once.  
> Finally, if I made any mistakes, or you think the text formatting sucks(which I totally get), please let me know through the comments. Thanks again, and a fantastic day to all of you!


	2. Double Jumpin' Jive (Part 1)

“Gah… what kind of awful place is this?” Ori muttered, deftly weaving his way around the spikes surrounding the long drop down to what he assumed was a way out. “First that guy drops us in here, then we get jumped by… a jumping slug, of all things… and now this... can it get any worse?”

“Don’t worry Ori,” Sein tried to reassure him. “There’s got to be a way out. That Gumon's in here with us too, after all.” “Right.”

Although his response was rather curt, Ori was thankful that Sein was there to help keep his head in the game, so to speak. He wouldn’t know what to do without Sein, who’d been the one to protect Ori throughout this whole ordeal.

Soon enough, Ori made it to the floor below. “Let’s drop a Soul Link here before you check out what’s up ahead,” Sein advised. “I’m sure you wouldn’t want to head through those spikes again if something goes wrong.” Ori nodded his head softly. “Thanks for looking out for me, Sein.” Just saying those words helped put a smile on his once downcast face.

“Oh… it’s nothing, really,” Sein bashfully muttered. “It’s all… part of the job, I suppose.”

“Still,” Ori butted in, not willing to let Sein have the last word on this. “You’ve really been so helpful to me. Sure, it’s your job… but I can’t help but see a bit of mama in you when you reassure me.” Ori flashed a bright smile, hoping Sein would let themselves accept his appreciation.

If the little orb of light could blush, they would. “That’s… awfully high praise from you, Ori. Do I really deserve to be compared to your mother?” “I don’t see why not.” Ori stared right at Sein’s blinding brightness, trying to gauge some sort of reaction from his guardian.

A moment of silence.

“Geez, Ori! I get it, I get it, no need to stare at me like I’m the second coming of the Spirit Tree!” 

Ori snickered, then broke out into laughter. 

“What’s so funny?”

Ori rolled around on the floor, trying to stifle the last vestiges of a chuckle. “Your reaction… ahhhh… that was priceless…”

Sein teetered on the edge of losing their composure, but barely managed to pull themselves together.

“Alright, alright. That was fun while it lasted, but we’ve still got to get out of this place somehow.” Sein barely got time to finish their sentence as Ori excitedly darted off into the distance. “Right! There’s gotta be something useful down this path!” “Ori, wait uuuuuup!”

Up ahead, Ori bounded off a platform suspended in the stagnant, Corrupted water he’d seen dotting the Grotto.

“So, what do you think it’s gonna be? Maybe a lever to lower some platforms?” 

Sein released a Charge Flame to blow back a Fronkey as Ori effortlessly slid under it, pushing himself back up onto his feet at a split second’s notice.

“Or a new set of Keystones for an area we haven’t explored yet! Or—”

Ori screeched to a halt as he saw what was in front of him.

“An Ancestral Tree?”

Lo and behold, in the dankest depths of the Moon Grotto, lay the final memorial to a fallen Spirit.

“Here? Now?” “An Ancestral Tree…” Sein mumbled.

Ori was noticeably downcast at the thought of one of his siblings dying in a place as dismal as this, surrounded by nothing but spikes, crushing death traps, and the occasional pool of toxic water. He shivered viciously, hoping to the Spirit Tree and whatever good was out there that he wouldn’t suffer the same fate. In the back of his mind, he knew that his Soul Links would spare him from such a miserable demise, but seeing the remains of his brethren never ceased to unnerve him. Life was fragile, even for beings of Light.

Sein slowly floated over to the tree. “Leru lay here. She was swift, agile, used to cut through the air.”

Ori perked up at this, then repressed that brief jolt of excitement quickly. Sure, it would be fun to move around even faster, but it wasn’t fair that Leru had to die such an awful death for him to have this power. Fil, Ano, and now Leru… 

“Ori…” Sein had clearly seen this locomotive train of thought chugging along in Ori’s head from his facial expressions alone. “Ori, there was nothing we could do to stop her death. It’s not your fault.”

“Y-yeah, I know, but—”

“The best thing you can do for Leru now is to take her ability and use it on our journey to save Nibel. I’m sure she’d be proud of you.”

“Yeah… you’re right.” Ori sat down on the stone-cold floor, running his hands over the rough bumps and edges. “Haaaaah… it’s just hard, y’know?”

“Of course it’s hard.” Sein moved closer to Ori, hoping that their presence would help him to feel even a little better. “I felt the same feeling when I was helplessly separated from the Spirit Tree.” Ori nodded, thinking back to the time he found Sein in the Sunken Glades. “It’ll get better. Trust me.” “Mm.”

“Besides, I know you really want Leru’s ability. You’re too obvious.” Ori couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “Oh, Sein, you’re too much!” “That’s coming from you!” Despite her reaction, Sein was really just glad Ori was back on his proverbial feet again. It couldn’t be easy to just accept the fact that he had to buckle up and save the entirety of Nibel. They were proud of him… almost like he was their child, making their way in the world.

Then again, considering their symbiosis with the Spirit Tree, he might as well be their child. Funny, that.

“Alright, Sein, let’s go!” Bounding to his feet, Ori laughed his heart out on his way to Leru’s Ancestral Tree. “Since you say I want this ability so much, why don’t we go and get it?” “Good grief, will I ever see the end of your teasing, Ori?” “...No promises!”

Stepping up to the tree, Ori prepared to absorb Leru’s Light. The light slowly wrapped around him as it had done before, lifting him up in its embrace before shrouding him in a brilliant burst of light. “I… I see them!—”

Memories flooded through Ori’s head, bright visions of hurtling through the air at full speed, wind whipping around white fur, Spirit Tree looming in the background… was he jumping  _ on _ the air? 

Ori’s mind blanked. Huh? What? What was this ability? How was this even possible? 

Ori’s hooves abruptly hit the ground, his mind not entirely there. He blinked once, twice, three times. Huh? “Ori, are you OK over there?” Sein asked. “Yeah, I just… don’t get it. In those memories, I was leaping through the air… off of nothing. It was exhilarating, but so confusing!”

Like a lightbulb turning on, Sein flashed a bit brighter. “Oh, that’s Leru’s ‘Double Jump’! That takes me back, watching all the little spirits grow jealous of that impossible-looking power of hers… anyways, I’d advise you to imagine you’re jumping off the ground as usual. Eventually it’ll end up feeling natural to you, just like it was to Leru.” “Well, OK…”

Ori crouched down for a running start, intending to use Double Jump to hop the ledge that he had fallen down to get to the tree in the first place. With a burst of energy, Ori kicked off the ground with his back hoof, breaking into a mad sprint in a bid to get the momentum he needed for this jump. His hooves clattered against the stone floors of the cavern, echoing in his ears. Just have to focus on making this jump… 

Ori took off, his right paw primed to find purchase on the ledge, only to remember that he’d need Double Jump to make the jump. 

He panicked.

What did Sein tell him before? Pretend you’re jumping off the ground? Ori weakly kicked off the air behind his hooves, but at that point he was leaning so far forward that he barely managed a pitifully short burst of movement forward. His hand slammed into the bottom of the ledge, holding onto a rock jutting out of the ledge. Acting quickly, Ori swiveled his left arm upwards and caught the top of the ledge, pulling his weight up and over the ledge.

“Agh!” Ori groaned, sitting down on the ledge as Sein caught up to him. “Why can’t I do this?” “What do you mean, Ori?” “Well, when I got Fil’s ‘Wall Jump’, it felt… natural to climb up that wall. Like I’d been doing it all my life. But I just don’t get Leru’s ‘Double Jump’. Why is it different?”

“Well… I don’t know how it feels to have a body at all,” Sein sighed at having to make that point again. “But if I can offer some advice, I think you’re looking at it from the wrong angle.” Ori tilted his head sideways, deep in thought. “What do you mean?” “Well, when you started to climb up the wall, you didn’t stop and wonder how you were going to climb.” Ori nodded, remembering his frenetic outburst and the ensuing rush of adrenaline. “But you had to think about how you were going to use ‘Double Jump’.” 

Ori put two and two together. “So are you telling me I’m supposed to… not think?” Ori scratched his head with his left hand, failing to grasp the benefits of not thinking. Not thinking before you acted, Mama Naru had taught him, leads to a lot of sadness for everyone involved. Ori gulped down air, definitely seeing how that advice could apply when faced with deadly spikes and Corrupted water.

“Yes.” 

Ori did a double-take. If Double Jump didn’t make any sense to him before, now it really didn’t make any sense. How could he just stop thinking whenever he had to make a jump?

“Listen to me, Ori. When you think about what you’re doing, you have to slow down, right?” Ori nodded hesitantly, not really sure where this was going. “When something becomes second-nature to you, you just do it—there’s no need to spend any time thinking. You don’t think about how to run. Can you imagine how much slower we’d be going if you had to remember how to run every time we stopped?” 

“When you put it that way…” 

“Good, so you get it.” 

Ori stopped a moment before hesitantly blurting out, “Yeah, I think so.” 

Unfortunately, in the spur of the moment, all subtlety was lost on Sein as they examined the obstacles ahead. “Perfect. Alright, drop a Soul Link. It looks like you have to use Double Jump to clear this pool of Corrupted water to get back.” “Huh?”

Ori swiveled his head around. Sure enough, the platform he had effortlessly sprung off to get to Leru’s tree had submerged, leaving no option but to use Leru’s Double Jump. “Oh, no…” 

“Come on, there’s no time for complaining now. Go on, go for it.” “Sein! You really aren’t making this any better!” Ori panicked again, shivering at the thought of being submerged in the toxic, stagnant water. “Besides, you saw how that first attempt went… I can’t do this! I have to get better, or practice, or something…” With that, Ori seemed to shrink into himself, fear breaking him down into a quaking mess. “Ori!”

Ori’s quivering stopped out of shock. “Ori… you can do this. Trust me, no matter how much you prepare, it won’t prepare you for the fear you face. When you’re scared, you have to trust your instinct. You have to just face the challenge head on.” Sein hovered close to Ori’s face, trying their best to soothe his worries.

“But… but…” “Do it for Leru, okay?” Sein pressed themselves against Ori’s cheek, letting a single sweatdrop fall onto them from Ori’s forehead. 

Bright light enveloped Ori, culminating in a small wisp that was promptly placed on the ground next to Ori. “Alright, Sein. I’m not sure I trust myself… but I trust you.”

Deep breaths. Inhale, 1, 2, 3, 4, exhale… 1, 2, 3, 4… 

Ori surged forwards before he could even stop to think about the consequences. Patter, patter, patter, patter. The wood bridge creaked under the force of Ori’s legs as he shot upwards, tumbling around in midair. Out of the corner of his eyes, he gauged the distance between him and the bridge in front as he spun around, barely glimpsing the Corrupted water at his feet.

…He wouldn’t make it!

Ori panicked again. There had to be something, anything he could do to save himself from helplessly plunging into that awful vat of corruption. His heart pounded through his chest as he neared impact, curling up to minimize exposure to the corruption’s toxins…

And then, just as smoothly as his hooves had lifted him off the ground, Ori felt his momentum shift. Ori was flung upwards by this unknown source of velocity, his body whirling like a ball that had just a bit too much topspin imparted to it.

Only moments later, Ori found himself faceplanted on the ground. “Ori! You did it!” Sein exclaimed, pride leaking through their chipper calls.

“I… I made it?” Ori pushed his upper body off the ground and slowly stood up. “Whoa, I made it!”

“Yeah! That Double Jump was amazingly executed!” Sein mused for a minute. “Might need to get better at sticking that landing, though.”

Ori whipped around, wrapping Sein in an embrace. “Thank you, Sein,” he mumbled as a joyous tear rolled down his cheek. “I would never have taken that leap of faith without you.”

“Oh, Ori… nevertheless, it was your own mental fortitude that helped you make the jump. I was only its guide.” “Oh c’mon, you silly little ball of light, take some credit for once! Did you see me shaking in my fur? That was scary as all Decay let loose!” Ori weakly laughed, his dry throat muffling the sound. Sein just groaned. “Ori, that’s awfully disrespectful to someone you called a parental figure minutes ago, you know!” Ori just stuck his tongue out, but it couldn’t hide the joy written all over his face.

With that, Ori bolted for the vertical corridor the pair entered from and started scaling the walls using the rugged, impatient technique bestowed to them by Fil. “What’s got you so enthusiastic, Ori?” Sein flickered in his peripherals in a vain attempt at teasing him back. “I thought you were complaining about these spikes just a while ago, hm?”

Ori grinned cheek to cheek, giving Sein flashbacks of the time he’d received Fil’s Wall Jump. “Now that I’ve got Double Jump down, isn’t this the perfect way to put it to the test?”

‘Spirit Tree preserve us, he’s entered… whatever state this is again.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally Double Jump was supposed to fit in a single chapter, but I felt it would help the pacing to just get to focus on the action stuff in a more action-oriented chapter. Admittedly, I was letting myself get hit by writer's block because I was so sure I had to keep it concise to prevent the chapter from feeling like it dragged on too long. Hopefully, the choice to split this up into multiple chapters makes sense to you too. In retrospect, it was pretty restrictive of me to expect myself to fit every movement-related ability and event into a single chapter anyways, so I'm glad that it came up so early in the process of writing this fic.
> 
> Moving on, I wasn't exactly sure where I would go with this chapter when I started, but the end result was heavily influenced by this video by Core-A Gaming called "Playing, Fast and Slow". (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4-EyNJhcQ8) Although the channel is mostly centered around fighting game analysis, the human psychology behind decision making they discuss is applicable anywhere, and this video is definitely a great example. 
> 
> If you think about it, the idea of a double jump is deceptively unintuitive. You have to teach your body to push against something you hardly think about as pushing against you, even if air pushes against you all the time. That's how I chose to interpret Ori's double jump, anyways, given the visual burst that always opposes the direction Ori double jumps in. So it made perfect sense to contrast it with the more natural idea of climbing(or wall jumping, if you want to nitpick, because Climb is a separate ability) up a wall.
> 
> On a final note, writing Ori and Sein's banter is ridiculously fun, especially when you consider that Ori's still a child. I still think there's a lot of room for improvement, especially in the sections where you feel the mood of the scene shift.
> 
> Anyways, thanks for sticking with me again. Once again, constructive criticism is always appreciated, and have a fantastic day!


	3. Double Jumpin' Jive (Part 2)

Ori hummed lazily, perched on top of a precariously positioned platform, suspended by nothing but a single rope from a beam of wood. His legs dangled off the platform, with seemingly no regard for the sharp, wooden mass of death below him.

“Ori?” Sein floated into his frontal view, snapping him back to reality. “Are you okay? You’ve been sitting here for a while now.”

“Yeah, I’m just thinking about how I’ll make this next jump.” Which was true, but soon enough Ori had started to reminisce about just how fun it was to relax on tree branches during a warm summer day, under the shade of the bright verdant leaves… 

He had to admit, this just wasn’t the same. But all things considered, he was making do just fine. 

Ori pushed himself to his feet, feeling the platform sway back and forth from his weight. “Alright! Let’s go!” He primed himself for a running start… wait, there’s no space for that here. Ori tapped his head with a closed fist, clearly a little miffed. He should’ve thought about that while he was “thinking about how to make the jump”, huh.

Ori turned around to look at Sein, who had faded back into his peripheral, only to notice the wall he had deftly scaled earlier to get here. He looked at the wall, then at the platform, back at the wall, back at the platform… and a plan formulated in the spirit’s cunning little brain. “Sein, do you mind stepping aside a little bit?”

“Hm? No problem, why—” was all Sein had time to get out before Ori leapt for the wall, paws spread wide to catch the best hold on the wall. 

“This is how I’m making this jump!” Ori enthusiastically yelled back. 

“So were you actually thinking about this ahead of time or—” A gust of wind cut Sein off for the second time as Ori kicked off the wall, kicked off the platform… and he was off!

Ori sailed through the air, waiting for the perfect time to use his newfound power to hurl himself towards the distant platform on the other side. In the meantime, it felt awfully nice to just be suspended above the world, not having to care about what lurked and crawled around the ground. Catching a glimpse of the Map Stone he had completed earlier, Ori felt a sense of progress rush through his heart. 

Noticing his perfect spacing between the two platforms, Ori gracefully touched down onto nothing. The feeling of solid ‘air’ against his hooves was almost indescribable. It was almost like glass in its smooth texture and rigidity at first, but it bent under Ori’s weight to make sure he didn’t hit anything too hard. The air melded like the wind to a wing, yet offered enough resistance to apply a sizable normal force to his hooves. Paradoxical, Ori decided, was the only word for it.

And before he even had time to complete that thought, he was soaring through the air again, his mind devoid of worries or cares. Despite the horrifying air of death that this hideout was shrouded in, Ori felt truly serene, a far cry from his first time using Leru’s Double Jump. Ori chuckled inwardly. He could get used to this!

The terrifying velocity at which the next platform rushed towards Ori yanked him out of his pleasant daydreams. ‘Right, right! I’m making this jump!’ Ori thought as he eyed the platform for grips. Fleet of foot and quick of wit, Ori hurled himself up the damp wood. The old, rotting wood caved under his weight, giving him just enough leverage to cling on to what was otherwise a mostly smooth surface. 

Forcefully flinging himself over the ledge with only the strength of his right paw, Ori careened past the rest of the platform and landed on all fours near a petrified plant on the floor below. “Nice going!” he yelled at no one in particular, congratulating himself on a job well done. 

“Nice going indeed!” Sein yelled back. “You kept your composure through the whole thing, too!”

“Yeah, that was great!” Ori chimed, his voice brimming with mirth. “I love Double Jump! I feel like I’m flying, like all the birds I see around Swallow’s Nest!” Ori flapped his arms, a paltry but heartful imitation of the sweeping beauty of flight.

“See, I told you it’d feel natural after a while.” Sein would grin cheek to cheek. If they could. Curses. 

Ori just nodded enthusiastically. “Well, I’m glad you were right!” He turned back towards the plant. “Oh, that’s right. Sein, do you mind blowing this up with Charge Flame?”

“Hm? What? Oh. Yeah, sure.” 

Ori tilted his head as the petrified plant burst open from the sheer light energy bursting out of Sein, but reassured himself that it probably wasn’t anything noteworthy as he scooped up the Spirit Light pouring out of the remains of the plant. 

“OK,” Ori breathed out. “I think I’m done. Let’s get going.” 

“Right. Hey, look out for that spider up ahead!”

“Agh!” A burst of Corrupted energy detonated at Ori’s feet, and in that moment Ori thanked the heavens above that Corrupted beings lacked in tracking what they made up for in numbers. Sein bombarded the spider with Spirit Flames as Ori slid under another energy blast, dropping into the hallway below. He barely registered the sound of the spider’s dying shrieks as his hooves dampened the impact of the stone-cold floor. Nice going, Sein!

Taking a moment to gather his bearings, Ori grimaced at the rhythmic pounding of stone behind him, assaulting the still pond of his mind with ripples upon ripples. “Poisoned water in front, crushing blocks to the back. …I think I’ll take my chances with the poisoned water,” he mumbled as he scratched the back of his head, plodding towards the broken remnants of what could’ve been a bridge in past life. 

“Ori, are you alright?” Looks like Sein caught up.

“Hm? I can’t hear you.” Ori had to fight to be heard over the thundering noise of the crushers on guard duty in the background. 

“Oh, never mind that. You seem alright enough,” Sein quipped, their intent completely masked by the clamor that went on behind the pair. Ori just shrugged. To be honest, he didn’t have a clue what Sein just said, so he was just going to hope it wasn’t all that important. Clearing the bridge, Ori was faced with a frog in the corridor ahead and… more spikes.

“Goodness.” Thankfully, Ori could hear Sein loud and clear this time. He desperately hoped there weren’t any more secret evil lairs with those nasty contraptions anywhere else in Nibel. “The spikes have come back with a vengeance, haven’t they?” 

“Well, it’s just two rows of spikes, right? I’d hardly call that coming back with a vengeance.” True to his word, Ori ended up clearing them with ease, using a tactically placed Charge Flame to throw Corrupted energy back at the spider that awaited them at the top of the vertical corridor. “See, like I was saying—”

Ori stopped dead in his tracks as he processed the image in front of him.

There was that sneaky little Gumon, surrounded by swathes of spikes as far as the eye could see… which wasn’t saying much in this tight corridor. Still. Those were a lot of spikes compared to what they had seen before. 

“Okay, I know we should focus on getting that Gumon, but… like you were saying?” Sein honestly had no clue whether they wanted to be a jerk or the responsible person in the room. Uncharacteristically, the jerk in them won out.

Ori, on the other hand, couldn't care less about whether Sein was being a jerk to him or not. Besides, even when they were being a jerk, Sein was nice. He couldn’t pin words to the feeling, but there was no way Sein would just hurt him for no reason. Hm. This jerk, on the other hand… 

Ori locked eyes with the spindly black creature, a fire burning in his heart, the likes of which he wasn’t even sure he could feel before.

This jerk just dropped him into a damp, dank death trap! You can’t just do that to someone else! Like, what the heck!

And so, the awkward, tense eye contact remained unbroken. It felt like hours and hours dragged on, locked in a deadlock for entirety… but Sein kept count. It took the Gumon about five whole seconds to divert his eyes and awkwardly shuffle away into the depths of his spiky maze. ‘Do you think he feels some sort of remorse for putting a presumably innocent child in this situation?’ Sein pondered to themselves. That certainly seemed probable, despite whatever his motives for stealing the precious Water Vein were.

This time, it was Ori’s turn to unintentionally drop the subtlety of the situation in an abyss. “Hey, get back here!” he yelled at the top of his voice. The only thing that came back to him were the echoes of his voice, dampened considerably by the sheer number of spikes lining the cavern walls. If Ori knew any vulgar expletives, now would be the time to pour them out in spades. Naru would never teach her child such things, though, so all Ori could muster was a rather peeved, “Heck!”

Sein could only chuckle, seeing this rather amusing outburst of anger. It was… surprisingly cute, even for Ori’s standards. It reminded them of watching little spirits argue over the most trivial things, romping in the Grove around the Spirit Tree.

And then Ori turned around.

Uhh… had he noticed? Sein was beginning to draft a preamble for their apology when Ori cut the rails to their train of thought.

“C’mon, Sein, we gotta go get ‘em!” 

“Of course. Right behind you.”

They’d call that one dodging a Light Burst.

Before this, Ori had never really had someone to compete with. With Naru teaching him most of what he knew, there was no competition to be had in the first place. A mother’s wisdom has no equal, after all, and who was he to pretend he was better at cooking or weaving than someone who’d been doing them her whole life?

But now? Something had sparked in Ori. A forest fire was burning through his heart, awakening a competitive drive that Ori never knew he had. If there was one thing Ori could do, he was sure this was it. Even if this was the Gumon’s home turf, Ori was born to run free. He wouldn’t let himself lose. He couldn’t! 

And all over again, the floodwaters of energy broke loose inside Ori. He could barely restrain himself long enough to chart his route through the initial wave of skewers—slide off the ledge, slip under the wall cutting off his vision with Double Jump, get to the wall on the other side he could just barrrrrely make out and GO _GO_ **_GO_**! 

Unable to resist the urge to take flight any longer, Ori charged at full speed towards the spike pit, a roaring crescendo of momentum as the ground rang out at the impact of his hooves. Left, right, left, right, left, right… and the world was cut silent as the last echo of his right hoof faded out. 

“Ori, Ori! You’re not going to make it!”

“Just watch, Sein!”

At the last second, Ori reached out with both arms and snagged a loose string hanging from the assembly of spikes above him. He cursed and celebrated their existence as he experienced the dizzying feeling of having his body thrown around by the string, with him just along for the ride. ‘How nice of that Gumon to have been so sloppy…’ Ori’s thoughts spat out as he started to feel light-headed. 

Ah! As his grip on reality loosened, so did his grip on the string! ‘Well, that was rather sloppy of me, too,’ some small part of his brain grumbled, before adrenaline kicked it off the wheel and into the backseat. 

Heading feet first towards the wall with the rest of his body trailing behind, Ori instinctively knew this orientation spelled bad news. But there wasn’t enough room to turn around! Time seemed to slow to a crawl as Ori flew towards the wall, his vision blurring as his thoughts churned around in his head. ‘Wait a minute, are you really going to try that?’ the backseat driver in his brain piped up. ‘Well, might as well!’

Feeling his hooves crunch into the stone wall, Ori furiously churned his legs in a desperate attempt to resist gravity’s deadly pull. Unbelievably, he was starting to gain some ground running up the wall, gravel and pebbles tumbling down as his hooves slammed into the rock. He could see the edge! If only he could sprint a bit further, he could clear it… But as his head lagged further and further behind the rest of his body, he knew he couldn’t keep this up any longer. He had to act. But what to do?

BAM! 

The impact of his foot on the wall drove him at a peculiar downwards angle, seemingly hurtling towards a spiky demise. Never count out the ingenuity of our favorite little daredevil, though. Stretching his arms out, he gracefully cartwheeled off the air, his soft paws feeling the air gently meld around them before Ori was violently forced upward. This time, he was perfectly ready to catch the wall as it hurtled towards him. Left paw and left hoof found their mark on the wall, quickly followed by the right side of his body. 

Ori just clung to the wall, inhaling madly, his pulse running amok. That was a close call, close call, close call… Phew. Okay. It had been close, but what’s new? C’mon, you can do better than that, you cheeky little goofball. You’ve got a Gumon to catch and a Water Vein to retrieve. 

Ori’s confident streak had come out full-force.

“Honestly, Ori! You nearly gave me a heart attack pulling that little stunt, and I’m not even sure if I can get heart attacks in the first place!” 

“Oh, c’mon, Sein. Heart attack or not, you have to admit that was slick.” Ori smugly grinned, slyly pushing aside the fact that he honestly didn’t know if he would end up skewering himself attempting that. 

“No, I don’t! Can you even call that a Double Jump at that point?”

Ori smirked, his delivery dripping with unadulterated confidence. “Hey, as long as it works, right?” And just like that, he leapt off the wall, laughing the entire time.

“...I really don’t get that kid,” Sein mumbled, trailing the hollering spirit as he flung himself around the tight corridors of the Gumon’s hideout like a rubber ball. They briefly considered the thought that it was almost inspiring to see him have this much fun, even while he was constantly surrounded by death. Sein ended up finding some solace in the idea that for little Ori, this grand quest wasn’t entirely gloomy and depressing.

Indeed, Ori couldn’t care less about the less pleasant implications of his journey to save all of Nibel at this moment. Unconvinced that his little wall-running venture should remain a figment of the past, Ori madly scrambled up the tiny vertical corridor, performing wall kick after wall kick to minimize the use of his hands.

Sein trailed closely behind, wondering how often they would have to change their stance on Ori’s growing arsenal of antics throughout the course of their adventure. “Okay, I can put up with the confusing maneuvers that miraculously save our glowy behinds, but you’re just trying to show off at this point.”

“Way past untrue! This is really fun once you get the hang of it!” Ori made the last kick, double jumping over one last bed of spikes and rolling once he hit the ground to mitigate the awkward angles he threw his weight at. 

“Honestly, that seems like a really useless thing to get the hang of.”

“Well…” For once, Ori had no retort. He could’ve just done that with a series of regular Wall Jumps, which were already deeply rooted in his muscle memory. “I dunno. It gets… boring after a while? Just doing things the easy way?”

“Right, and seeing you throw your life on the line is better than watching you do it the easy way?”

Ouch. And Ori thought he didn’t have a retort to the last statement. He hung his ears, remorse flooding his gentle eyes. “...Sorry, Sein. You’re right. I should’ve thought how you felt…” Even if he was sure he could nail every last jump and landing, the risk of death was never zero. He wasn’t sure the adventurous side in him could accept that uncomfortable reality, but… he’d have to, for Sein’s sake.

Oh. This was not exactly the reaction Sein wanted to provoke when they said that. Oh no oh no oh no. They should’ve known. Even if he could be rambunctious at times, Ori was still a sweet, considerate child at heart. On the contrary, they should’ve thought about how he felt, not the other way around. And didn’t they just tell themselves that it was fine for him to live a little on this adventure, anyways? How could they go back on their thoughts so quickly? They cursed their meandering mind. 

“No, no, no. This isn’t right. I should be the one to think about how you feel,” Sein blurted out, a mirror of Ori’s remorse. 

“Huh? But I’m the one doing stupid stuff just for fun!” Ori protested, hands splayed out as if to demonstrate his own foolishness. “You’re just trying to keep me safe… and here I am goofing off like a kid.” 

“You  _ are _ a kid though. And sometimes, kids and even adults have to take risks to find their own limits. Fil, Ano, Leru… I don’t know how many times they had to endure failure just to scratch the surface of their powers. I’d be stupid to stop you from doing the same, even if I don’t like the way it looks on the surface.”

Ori just pouted, mulling it over. “I don’t know, Sein. I didn’t even think of myself as taking risks or improving until this point… I just kind of did what I wanted. Isn’t that pretty selfish?” 

“Sometimes, being selfish is alright,” Sein murmured, giving Ori the impression of a gentle brook in spring. 

Hm. That was a new way of thinking. 

“Blindness be damned, I’m being pretty selfish asking you to go to the ends of Nibel with me. I’d be nothing but a hypocrite if I wrote you off as selfish.”

“What? No, don’t talk about yourself like that!” Ori seethed, kicking a pebble as hard as he could. In the distance, the faint sounds of a Corrupted frog whining hinted at the force Ori put into that kick. “How can I let you call yourself selfish when you’ve always been there for me since the moment I found you!” Fury dripping out of his eyes, Ori balled his hand into a fist, then turned to Sein. “Promise me you won’t do it again!” 

“Ori… I…” 

“Promise!”

Ori hung his head, his spirit broken. Why couldn’t Sein see how important they were to him? They weren’t selfish for asking that from Ori. How could they be? He thought back to when Sein poked fun at his wildly incorrect prediction, and how he could have laughed merrily along with them if he wasn’t so preoccupied with being mad at the Gumon. How could he be mad at his friend, the first one he could ever call his friend?

After clearing their head, Sein offered a proposition. “OK, but you’ve got to promise me something first.”

Ori perked up. “Anything. Just don’t be mean to yourself anymore.”

“Promise me you’ll keep doing your best to selfishly have fun on this trip.”

“...I don’t get it.”

“It can’t be easy for you to travel across all of Nibel and face danger at every turn. I don’t want to make it any harder on you by forcing what I think upon you. You’re seeing most of Nibel for the first time, and I couldn’t stand the thought of hampering that experience with my complaining. Please. Promise me you’ll do what it takes to keep yourself smiling, even if I don’t like it.”

“Oh… I see. Well—” Ori paused. If it was for Sein’s sake, then he wouldn’t turn them down. “Alright. I promise.” A small smile formed on his face as one last tear rolled down his cheek.

“...that’s good.” A sigh of relief. If Ori could smile again, that was all they needed. “Then I promise that I’ll stop putting myself down. Is that good enough for you?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I think it is.” Ori wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. 

All of a sudden, the pair was cut off by a muffled groaning sound. 

“Hey, what was that?” Ori asked, swiveling towards the source of the noise, only to see no evidence of the frog that once patrolled the hall. Scampering down the long hallway, Ori saw a faint trail of deep purple blood, a sign the Corrupted had once been here. ‘Scratch the whole no evidence thing,’ he thought as he leaned over the ledge at the end of the hallway.

There lay a Corrupted frog, now naught but mincemeat from its deadly fall. In its left eye socket, a single pebble had taken the place of its old eye, not that it would need that eye anymore. 

“Huh,” Ori rubbed his chin. “Wonder how that happened.”

“Spirit Tree almighty, you are definitely scarier than you look at first glance.” Sein hovered around his head, taking in the rather bizarre spectacle.

“Appreciate it, Sein.” Ori grinned, amused by the strange turn of events, and oh heavenly Light deliver us what is that?

Looking up, Ori and Sein saw what they could only describe as a demented sight. How did that Gumon manage to take the crushing pillars and make them even more unnaturally horrifying? Below, a sea of wooden spikes. Above, pillars that moved up and down at regular intervals, opening the way only for it to be blocked by the next pillar.

“Whyyyyyyy? Why??” Ori yelled, clenching his fists in a blend of confusion and frustration. 

“At least we can hear each other this time,” Sein pointed out. 

“I guess!” Ori threw his hands up. “How does he keep coming up with these ideas?” Although it was masked by the pillars in the way, the pair could barely make out the guffaws of a clearly amused Gumon. 

“Oh, mock me, will you?” Ori whined, giving into his exasperation. “At least I’m not the mastermind behind whatever this nonsense is!” And in that moment, Ori remembered how frustrated he had been at the Gumon mere minutes ago. He thought about how much he wanted to catch up to him and wrangle the darn Water Vein from the Gumon’s grasp… and then stick his tongue out at him. Yeah, that sounded about right.

“Well, I’m not stopping you. Have at it.”

“Right. Right. I have to pass these stupid nonsense pillars first. Gosh.”

As the first pillar came down, Ori leapt for it and clung on for dear, dear life. Better safe than sorry with this craziness. A realization struck him as it brought him up with it—despite its nightmarish appearances, it was really more boring than nightmarish. …He was going to be here for a while, wasn’t he?

Noticing that the available grip space was slowly receding, Ori just let go, using Double Jump to propel himself to the next pillar. He hoped from the bottom of his heart that the smug Gumon wasn’t actually prepared for him using Leru’s nonsensical power for this equally nonsensical gateway. 

Repeating the process twice, the only thing Ori could think about was how much of a jerk you’d have to be to make someone do this three times. Seconds crawled by like minutes, minutes crawled by like hours. There was nothing to do but hang there. Even Sein groaned and startled to ramble on about how at this point, they really missed Ori getting to be an adrenaline monkey, whatever that meant. Ori hoped it didn’t mean he was actually a monkey, because that would be weird. He was pretty sure he was a spirit, through and through.

...Ah, finally! They made it! Alright, now Ori totally had that Gumon cornered, and they could finally take the Water Vein and scoot on out of here…

The Gumon was undoubtedly startled to see them here, but managed regained his composure and easily leapt to the other side with his long, spindly legs, scrambling off into the distance. 

“Oh,” Ori mumbled, half-asleep at this point. “Darn.”

“Huh. I was expecting a bit more of a reaction from you, seeing the way you were whining him earlier.” 

“Well… if I remember correctly, according to the Map Stone there’s just a big vertical corridor up ahead that lets us out of here… so it can’t be that bad, right?” Ori lazily scratched the back of his head. 

“Why do I feel like it will end up being that bad?” 

“Huh?”

“Nothing, nothing.”

Ori groaned inwardly. Of course it wouldn’t just be “not-that-bad”. Since when was there ever a straight vertical corridor that he could simply climb without worrying about Corrupted plants spitting their toxic fluids at him or slugs flinging their nails at him like deranged, misshapen porcupines? Thinking back, he almost missed the spikes and their stationary, predictable nature, even if the Corruptions were themselves rather predictable.

Oh, well. At least they’d be out of this gloomy place soon enough. Concentrating his light into his chest and drawing it out into the world, Ori formed a Soul Link on the ground. It wouldn’t do to get sent back all the way to Leru’s tree if he fell here. Ori grimaced at the thought, sickened by the irony of coming back from the dead next to the grave of his fallen kin.

“For Leru,” he thought aloud as he cleared the gap with her signature technique. 

Darting down the dark corridor the Gumon left through, Ori carefully probed the path ahead for any signs of traps or Corrupted guard animals. Trailing behind him, Sein’s Light illuminated the way, just one more of the reasons he was grateful for their constant presence.

Huh. Nothing so far except a small array of easily circumvented spikes, although that alone wasn’t enough to get Ori to let down his guard. But as he climbed further and further up the empty passageway, he started to question his survival instincts. It really looked like there wasn’t anything here. But that couldn’t be true… could it?

And as suddenly as a static shock when you least expect it, Ori heard the echoes of the faint creaks of a lever turning, followed by… a loud groan as something heavy slammed down onto… something unidentified. Probably the Gumon. Then, a loud rumbling, drowning out the groans in a whirling hurricane of sound.

Ori gulped down air. That was not a good sign, even if it meant the Water Vein was now ripe for the picking.

“Ori… I think you’d better get going, fast!” 

Ori wasn’t about to just disregard that advice. Leaping for the closest wall, Ori narrowly managed to avoid a rock almost as big as he was slamming into the ground next to him. Oh goodness, what had he gotten himself into? Was he the one even getting himself into this mess? 

Panic setting in, he frantically flung himself up the sheer surface, not even stopping to glance where he was grabbing onto. There was no time, and no need. His paws and hooves simply knew where to go the moment they brushed against the cold, damp stone. 

Taking a brief look back, he realized he wasn’t in any danger just clinging to the wall, giving him the time to breathe a sigh of relief. Still, the relentless tide of rubble irregularly cut off the path forward, forcing him to wait out high tide. And the sound! It was overwhelming, constant crashing like waves on the shore. Ori tried his best to muffle the sound by folding his ears, but it wasn’t much use. At least when he was moving, he could sort of tune it out, but now he just had to hold onto his sanity as the rumbling cascaded through his head.

Finally finding a gap in the storm of stones, Ori seized his opportunity and took off, darting up the next wall and into a small alcove where the tumbling rocks wouldn’t reach him. He wanted oh-so-bad to just take a break here, but he considered the possibility that the maddening noise surrounding him would outweigh any semblance of rest he could find. 

Ori shook his head reluctantly. He would have to just press on. Behind him, Sein was trying to get something across to him, but he couldn’t hear them at all. Ori shook his head again, this time aggressively. Why did all these stupid obstacles have to cut him off of from communicating with Sein? And he thought the crushers were bad!

Stamping the ground with his right hoof, Ori steeled his resolve. No use in moping! He’d just have to let himself be motivated by their presence, rather than by their words. 

Launching himself to the next wall, he shed his fear and trepidation, growing a furiously relentless streak that only shows itself when you’re aggravated beyond the brink of return. He’s gonna get this done, all the rocks in the world be damned! …Where did he learn that word again? He’s sure he’s never heard Naru say it.

Threading the needle between two tightly packed rocks to reach the wooden ramp above him, Ori boldly stomped on the rock closest to him and leapt off, his unbridled energy driving him to move with no regard for his own safety. Elegantly sidestepping a boulder that was moving to pin down his left leg, he let his momentum carry him forward as his hooves screeched across the floor, friction carrying out its duty as he slid into the wall. 

Glancing up, Ori gauged the situation, his tense muscles taking a breather. He seemed to be safe under the overhang directly above him. That was good. He gave a thumbs up for no one in particular, although in retrospect Sein probably saw that and wondered what the heck that was for. Rocks tumbled down the overhang, with no wooden ramp to divert their flow this time. If that wasn’t bad enough, more rocks tumbled down from some unseen precipice, presumably just out of his field of vision. Yikes. He’d have to be a little more careful this time… or did he?

Looking a bit more carefully, these rocks seemed to fall at an almost blatantly obvious tempo, reminding Ori of the beat of his own footsteps. First the unknown source, then the overhang. Left, right, left, right… Instead of being mired in their cacophony, Ori found himself drawn in by the naturalness of their rhythm.

Drilling the rhythm into his brain, Ori willed his paws and hooves to meld their motion to the music seamlessly, like a lead guitarist preparing to jump in on a bassline. Waiting for the calming lull between two beats, Ori made his move. His heartbeat rang out as he hurtled towards the wall across from the overhang, and on the count of four… 

The crash of a rock rang out as Ori came in with the main riff, dead on time. “Perfect!” Ori cheered, his vertical trek up the corridor spurred on by his success. The end was in sight now! Vaulting over the ledge, he slid to a stop, a brazen smile taking over his previously tense facial features. 

Now that Ori had brought himself above the auditory anarchy below, he could take his time and think through his next move… and maybe, just maybe, have himself a bit of fun. What tools did he have at his disposal? In front of him, the overhang he was already well acquainted with. Above him, a crevice from which stones hailed the ground below. Honestly, he had no clue how they came out at such a regular rhythm. More of the Gumon’s incorrigible nonsense, he supposed.

But what interested him most was a single platform strung with rope from a higher overhang, not unlike the one he spent a good deal of time perching on a while ago. Now that was something he could work with. Craning his head upwards, he would have to guess the ceiling was just about level with the top of the platform.

“Ori… just what exactly are you planning now?” Sein tore him out of his thoughts, their bright light pulling his sightline in.

Huh? 

“Don’t act like I don’t see that devilish look on your face!”

Oh. Was he really that easy to read? Ori blushed sheepishly, burying his head in his palms. He guessed it wasn’t that bad if it was just Sein and him, but still… Oh no no no. He couldn’t lose his cool now… 

Sein just giggled, helpless against the priceless expression painted across his face. “Hey, remember what I told you? I won’t stop you. Go on, tell me! I want to know!” 

“Agh… you’ve got me. Alright,” Ori shook his head, his floppy ears flailing about. “So you see that platform over there, with the string?”

“Yeah, I see it.”

“Well, I was thinking… if I can grab onto the bottom of that platform with enough, I can swing and Double Jump up to the top without ever having to land on that overhang over there.”

“Somehow, this is the most sane stunt you’ve proposed today.” 

“I mean, it’s also the only stunt I’ve proposed today, so that isn’t saying very much.” A gentle smirk took over Ori’s face, the last hints of a blush fading away. “But I appreciate the compliment anyway.”

“Pshaw, you know what I mean!” Sein laughed, their voice pealing like a wind chime.

“Of course I do!” Ori waved his paw faux-dismissively, his other paw dramatically resting on his hip. He clamped both eyes shut, trying way too hard to sell the effect to his audience of one. “Doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun with it!”

“Alright, buster, now you’re having too much fun. C’mon, we’ve got a Water Vein to pilfer and a Gumon’s hideout to escape!” Sein lightly bumped against Ori’s shoulder in their best imitation of a pat on the back. Ori’s short, soft fur briefly made them consider making that a habit.

“Already wayyyyy ahead of you!” Ori bolted up the wall, far too bubbly and bouncy to keep himself from getting on the move. 

“Yeah, right! Like I’d believe that!” Finally, Sein got the last word in. 

Ori’s mind was far too muddled with glee to consider his possible retorts. He’d finally get out of here, get that Water Vein, and he’d get it done his way. Jubilantly leaping for the platform, he was about to break free of the little alcove as his line of sight was immediately cut off by a falling rock. Oh. Oh no. He had completely forgotten about those rocks!

With no time to think, Ori took the same approach he took to learning Double Jump—just hurl himself at the problem. Leaning into the incoming collision rather than making any attempt to back up, Ori instinctively thrust his arms out to grip the rock like he would a wall. His fight-or-flight response had activated, and some small part of his brain must have chosen fight, throwing his entire thought process out of whack. ‘This really shouldn’t work. This really shouldn’t work. Why am I trying this?’ 

Too late to think about that. Feeling his paws brush against the mossy, cracked surface of the stony projectile, Ori simply hurled it downwards in the desperate hopes of gaining some lift. To his pleasant surprise, he actually ended up being flung upwards from the impromptu “collision”, watching as the rock continued on its rapid descent to the floor below. 

Taking care not to let himself get caught by easily avoidable surprise after easily avoidable surprise, Ori shot both paws up to catch the bottom of the platform. Snapping an iron-tight grip onto the corner of the wood, Ori rode out his momentum up, up, up… and in the brief instant where he felt his body come to an abrupt stop, he swung his legs up at full speed, letting them carry the rest of his body into a backflip. ‘Here comes the hard part!’ his internal hype-man cried, only bolstering his morale.

His heart pounded through his chest, a living metronome keeping time for him. All of a sudden, Ori felt his memories yanking him back to the very first time he’d flung himself through the air. The world fell silent, the air his only companion as he acutely sensed his rotation, waiting for the perfect moment to stick the landing.

Only this time, the landing didn’t have to be on the ground.

He knew it for sure—he was upright once again. Stamping on the air as forcefully as he could, Ori flung himself into another backflip, his head a bright, dizzy mess as he touched down on questionably solid ground again. Shaking off his temporary weakness, it was only a proverbial skip and a hop—or maybe a Double hop?—to the top, where he found none other than the pesky Gumon who had been a thorn in this time, his legs pinned under a massive boulder, rivalling the one he’d seen in the Sunken Glades. Ori grimaced, thinking about how this jerk was so close to subjecting him to the same fate. 

But Ori saw something else—the Gumon’s eyes. Eyes filled with fear, with vulnerability, with pain. Maybe even an ounce of resignation, understanding that he didn’t deserve any better than to be cut down where he stood for what he had put this child through. 

Before he knew what he was doing, Ori slowly plodded over, his legs moving with a will of their own. He couldn’t leave someone to die like that. He’d died like that. He’d died a slow, painful death, his legs giving out as pain tore him up from the inside, trapped inside a body that could no longer listen to him. …A phantom pain bore into his hooves just from thinking about it. Ori, resurrected child of the Spirit Tree, would not have blood on his hands. 

Slowly and surely, he dragged the heavy load of stone off the Gumon, taking care to not put additional pressure on his wounded legs. …There. 

Fear still flashing in his eyes, the Gumon looked at Ori briefly. Was it a look of gratitude, admiration, or confusion? Then, they slowly slinked away, leaving a shocked Ori to wonder about the ramifications of what he had just done. “Hey! Can I finally have that Water Vein, at least?”

Silence. Damn it all, Ori should have done that first. Sure, it wasn’t a good look to kick a Gumon while he was down, but the forest wasn’t going to restore the Ginso Tree’s Element by itself. Letting out a long sigh of regret, Ori worked up the energy he had left and plodded on forwards. At least he was out of there.

So imagine his surprise when he found the Water Vein abandoned the cusp of the bridge, shining as brightly as a radiant cut of aquamarine. Wrapping his arms around the blue orb, Ori found himself lost in the calming aura the orb emitted. Looking up, he saw the Gumon looking back from across the gap, a remorseful, melancholy smile cracking through a veneer of stoicness.

And then something in Ori cracked too.

“Hey, how did you even make that jump? Your legs got buried under a boulder minutes ago!”

The Gumon, shocked beyond all words, had no response. The little spirit had a point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The more you write about the high-flying shenanigans of our favorite little spirit, the more you have to think about how his travelling companion feels about it. I almost teared up just picturing how Ori reacts in that mid-chapter scene. For me, the general point of this fic is to capture some of the better side of having to trek throughout a massive stretch of Nibel on a life-or-death quest, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized even that isn’t all roses.
> 
> On the more lighthearted side of things, writing character interactions is such a blast that I couldn’t help but try to do Ori’s first meeting with Gumo justice. It totally ended up taking too long for just three short interactions though… haha. With that in mind, we’ll definitely be seeing Gumo again, even if Ori’s not.
> 
> Also, I guess I just taught Ori a swear. I hope the vast implications of this doesn’t cause the universe as we know it to implode.
> 
> Final thoughts, because it seems I always ramble on too long in these notes: Is the pacing of this chapter alright to read through? Does it drag on too long? Are certain scenes too short? I definitely feel like with the upcoming Ginso tree and how integral that part of the game is to Ori’s movement, I’ll be writing an even longer chapter or set of chapters if I’m not stopped. So all input is appreciated!  
> Thank you, as usual, and a fantastic week to you!(Seems fitting, since I took about a week on this one)


	4. Dire Straits of Ginso

“Hey Sein, is that rumbling supposed to happen when you restore the Element?” Ori trembled, not out of fear, but in sync with the floor. The Lightcatchers hanging from the branches above silently echoed his concern as they were jostled around against their will. Concerning indeed.

Sein, too engrossed in their work and the resulting light show, let that one go in one proverbial ear and out the other. “...What?” 

Clearing his throat with a rather deliberate, overly enunciated cough, Ori tried again. “I said, is that rumbling supposed to happen when you restore the Elements?”

“Hm? Oh yes, of course. To bring back balance to an under-regulated element, the Element has to first make up the deficit by stimulating a rapid flow of their respective energy.”

Ori blinked. “Uh. Nibellian, please?”

“Basically, since we just restored the Element of Waters, the Ginso Tree will begin to flood soon.”

“Are you serious?!” Ori reeled back at how nonchalantly Sein made such a grave announcement, causing him to almost fall over at the mere presence of a tremor. 

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be? This happens every time.” 

“Why didn’t you tell me this?” Ori grasped his head in his hands, his ears wilting like a flower severed at the stem. 

“Oh. …I knew I was forgetting something.” Sein turned away from the Element, their job handily wrapped up aside from the fact that there was a very real chance of both of them getting caught in the rising floodwaters. “Okay, let’s go!” they announced as they drifted to his side.

“Let’s go is an understatement!” Ori yelled as he hurriedly tried to concentrate his Light into a Soul Link. C’mon, Ori, bring the Light to your heart. Focus, focus, feel it flow through your fingertips… there. The signature wisp of blue flame made its mark on the Ginso Tree’s heartwood. 

Not even giving himself a split second for a sigh of relief, Ori made a mad dash for the nearest Lightcatcher, spurred on by an unrelenting feeling he could’ve sworn he hadn’t felt in a while. But he couldn’t pin it down. He didn’t even have the time to try. 

Gathering all his might into his legs, Ori sprung up and took hold of the Lightcatcher using Bash just as a spray of water lapped at his left hoof. ‘Too close for comfort,’ he thought as time’s flow ground to a standstill, freezing water droplets to his hoof and leaving a cold, tingly feeling he just couldn’t shake.

…Honestly, he still wasn’t used to the otherworldly sensation of seeing the world stop as the full power of Reem’s Bash took control. Unlike the serene feeling of flying through the air with Leru’s Double Jump, Bash was… jarring. Disruptive. Discordant, even. It didn’t feel… natural to just see everything stop like that. Especially as he could feel the very pulse of his heart fade out. 

…It gave him bad memories of his first death.

Ori made an attempt to blink as his eyes glossed over. Bash made it impossible, but nevertheless Ori barely managed to save himself from drowning in a sea of his own thoughts. 

No, no, no no no. He wouldn’t let it happen again. Not here. Not now. 

Ori simply willed his body to move towards the next Lightcatcher. With hardly even a muscle moved, a burst of momentum threw Ori towards his destination like a fuzzy, glowing cannonball. All he had to do was to Bash off of it again… and again… and, if he wasn’t mistaken, again. All the while, Ori’s stomach reeled at how awkwardly the flow of time stopped and started seemingly without any reason or rhyme to it, even if Ori himself was both the reason and the rhyme. 

But he couldn’t stop, no matter how much he hated the music of his movements. The floodwaters were rising, and Sein was counting on him to make it out in one piece. Ori became acutely aware of this fact as he heard the erratic crashing of water in the brief interludes between each and every Bash. 

Finally, amidst a blur of bright white light and a sea of beige and umber, Ori found himself back on stable footing. Letting out a sigh of relief, Ori bent over with his paws on his knees. A vague sense of desperation rose in his heart as he scanned the area for a route to safety. He just had to find something, some way out, and then it would be alright.

…Nothing. Brambles lined the tree’s interior all around him, guarding the only viable path upwards. He winced, the remnants of his fatal march through the briar patches whirling in his mind. 

…But he was stronger now. If he had to, he would… 

Out of nowhere, a screech echoed through the chamber. Jolting at the sound, Ori found himself peering up at a Fronkey, hellbent on taking his life even amidst the looming threat of a watery grave.

“Man, you guys don’t know when to give up, do you?” Ori quipped. The two locked eyes, and then they pounced.

“Idiot.”

The Fronkey, unable to even perceive what had just happened, found itself unexpectedly plummeting into the deep blue abyss below as Ori found his hooves meeting solid ground. The tumult of the aqueous annihilation surrounding him assaulted his ears, but Ori could still barely make out the sound of a dying howl. 

Ori sighed, unaware of his quivering feet. “Good Nibel, that was too close,” he barely spat out as he broke out in a sprint for a glowing gateway ahead. Hopefully, just hopefully, he could gain some ground if the Tree’s mystical power sent him to the right place.

Clenching his eyes shut, Ori threw his body through the gate, stumbling on a knot before gaining full access to all his senses again. 

His heart sped up as he heard the roll of the floodwaters, hardly any more muted than before. How much ground had he actually gained? By the sounds of it… No. No!

He couldn’t think about that. He had to keep pressing on. His heart beating through his chest, Ori broke out into a mad dash towards the nearest wall, unsure of what to do or where to go except up. The knocking of his hooves against the Ginso Tree’s heartwood echoed through the chamber before getting drowned out by the cacophony of the deluge. That… wasn’t good.

Ori’s mind went blank and his eyes glazed over as he heard the faint rumbling below him crescendo. No time. No time. No time. It ricocheted around in his brain, wracking his head with vibrations, but he couldn’t find himself moving a muscle. No time! No time! No time! 

“Ori!” Sein screamed from behind his head, the full urgency of the situation emerging in their normally melodious tone. “What’s gotten into you? This isn’t like you!” 

Ori’s eyes refocused as his trembling muscles gradually broke free of their shackles. “Ahh—” was all he could manage as he broke out into a clumsy sprint, his breath faltering as fear began to stick in his throat. He couldn’t even see clearly amidst the reflected pools of blue mingling with the deep brown tones of the tree’s wood, but he could still make out his destination. A hollow tunnel lay overhead, with a crack in the bottom he could slip into if he could just scale the neighboring wall. 

With labored breathing, he righted his posture and made off for the wall. Alright. It would be alright. He just had to make it up, and he would be fine. He’d be fine! A glimmer of hope rose in Ori’s chest, staving off his fear as he bounded for the wall. 

Latching onto the coarse grain of the wall’s wood, Ori painstakingly dragged his body up inch by inch, his grip quaking every step of the way. But… but he could barely hear the rumble of rushing water fade out in the background. All he had to do was keep it up. Keep it up. Keep it up. A bead of sweat rolled down his face as Ori finally pulled himself through the gap, collapsing on the floor. ‘No problem, right?’, he thought to himself as he pushed himself to his feet. 

“Ori!” Sein called out, alighting on his head like a butterfly. “Are you okay? You look like you’re really pushing yourself… Do you think you can keep going?” 

Ori abruptly let out a sigh, his chest shuddering violently. “I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine,” he muttered as another wave of fatigue coursed through his body. “This is nothing… it should be nothing...” Ori’s voice trailed off into the distance as he stared into the vaguely soothing emptiness of the magic gateway ahead. 

“Be careful about those thorns, Ori! Don’t get lost in the bright lights!” 

“Uh-huh.” Oh. He hadn’t even noticed the thorns. How did he not even manage to give them a passing glance? He stanced up for a running start, giving the distance to safety a quick eyeball. Just a simple double jump. No problem. He’d done so many between when he first faced his fear at the bottom of Moon Grotto and now. 

So why was his heart throwing a fit at the mere sight of thorns? 

He pushed it aside, and just took the leap.

Time seemed to slow down in those tense few moments. The sickeningly familiar sensation ate at Ori’s gut, tearing his already limited cognition into shreds. 

…

Pain shot through his right leg as the rest of his limbs met with damp wood, yanking his awareness back from the brink. Ori let a shrill yelp leap from his throat as his leg reflexively pulled itself off the spiny growths below. Instinctively, Ori took a look back at the scene… and regretted it immediately. Panic threatened to take over his entire being as he saw red pour out of three deep, gaping gashes on his lower leg. No!— Here— Now— How?

How could he have let this happen? 

Sein was yelling—something, he could hardly make it out amidst his pounding heartbeat and his head starting to feel light—but in the end, it didn’t matter. Ori groaned as he pushed himself to his feet, his arms quivering as if they were a dragonfly’s wings in flight. A tear slipped out of his eye as he limped onwards on his remaining good leg. He knew he had to get out of here. He had to get out fast. The fear that had a stranglehold on his mind and body told him as much.

…But how much longer could he keep struggling like this?

Trudging forward, he wordlessly slipped through the portal and into the unknown as water lapped at the log’s floor. He wanted to collapse, but his body moved forward anyway, animated by a scrap of hope for the tree’s labyrinthine layout showing him mercy. Even a single healing plant might be able draw the line between life and death.

As the ethereal lights of the Ginso Tree faded away, Ori felt his resolve crumble as he saw what lay in wait. Steep precipices of heartwood, dotted with barbed vines, lay randomly dispersed around the room, creating a chaotic stairway to the top. A minute passageway carved into the wood, illuminated by a single Lightcatcher dangling in front of it, held the promise of progression.

…And still, nothing in sight to alleviate the debilitating injury on his right leg. 

His ears wilted, his head sunk down in despair. It would have been so easy, so easy!— with both of his legs… but he had to go and throw it all away! Tears and sweat soaked his fur as he finally let it sink in that, for the first time in a while, there was nothing he could do but wait for death. Crumpling on the floor, he listened through the wood as the roar of the incoming torrent of water grew louder and louder, deafening crash after deafening crash. 

...This was it, huh. Maybe he’d be lucky enough to go unconscious before… before he was brought back at the Spirit Link. 

Amidst the sonic chaos of wood splintering and the water rumbling below him, a screech above him forced his attention upward. A Fronkey, presumably having its motion mistaken for an intruder’s, plummeted to the floor a few meters from him as a wad of Decay burst onto its head. That could only mean one thing. Ori turned his head skyward, and was immediately proven correct as he saw the slimy form of a mortar worm tunnel back into its home in the Ginso Tree. 

Ori had one chance to get this right. The floor rumbled beneath him, almost about to give way. The Fronkey, filled with malice against the Light, jumped. The world seemed to slow down. And then it did slow down. And then it stopped.

He was already deathly still on the ground, so his stomach dodged the worst of it, but Ori’s head felt empty as he scoured what little range he could see for the best vantage point possible. There. The second one from the right was perfect.

Letting himself fly towards the elevated outcrop of wood, Ori immediately realized that he hadn’t steeled himself for the gut punch of accelerating so quickly from rest. Hurtling through the air, Ori couldn’t even manage to avoid splatting onto the wood like the Fronkey he had just forced to faceplant. His heart racing, Ori thanked his lucky stars that he had made it up at all as he rolled over to face the ceiling. 

On cue, the mortar worm stirred again, wondering who dared to disturb its vaguely defined territory twice. Aggravated at such a grievous offense, the worm eagerly spat out another concoction of Decay, which was about as close as it could get to a death sentence. With that, it burrowed back into the depths of the Ginso Tree, blissfully unaware of the flood about to wipe out its habitat. 

…Okay. This was it. He had to do this, no matter how bad it felt. C’mon, c’mon, closer, closer… 

In the split-second before the projectile made contact, Ori weakly thrust out his palms, wrapping it and himself in Reem’s signature spectrum of light. His breath got caught in the back of his throat as everything came to a stop. …Okay, okay. He did it. Now all he had to do was find the Lightcatcher and get out of here. 

He tried to blink, but his eyelids were frozen in place. Blurry… everything was so blurry… ‘When did this happen?’ Ori asked himself as he tried in vain to focus his eyes. All he could make out was a blend of browns and blues. The desperation and fear tried that he had pushed deep, deep down in his heart started welling up again. ‘No, no, no! Don’t worry! You can’t afford to worry!’ he screamed internally, his head going to war with itself. 

But out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a bright gleam piercing through the haze drifting over his eyes. Not even giving it a moment of thought, Ori threw his body at the light source. Flying by like a cannonball, the deafening noise of wood splintering and sizzling below Ori betrayed the true force that shot him through the air. He felt like a leaf, helpless against the overwhelming force of a gale. His ears threatened to implode on themselves as water started to burst through the wood below, bombarding his ears with cacophonic crashes and his eyes with bursts of blue. 

...Ori wasn’t sure whether he couldn’t feel the pain because he was just used to it, or if his body was just too overloaded to care.

Even as the world shot by in a fuzzy amalgamation of muted browns and greens soaked in blue, Ori couldn’t have missed his target if he tried. Still mired in the purple haze of unadulterated speed, Ori barely managed the mental concentration needed to reach out towards the lone Lightcatcher hanging from the ceiling. Closer… closer… There! 

Ah… The once-crystal-clear brilliance emitting from the Lightcatcher was starting to bleed into the chaotic color palette of the scene as Bash pulled the two light sources together. Everything seemed to just… melt into the background. Helplessly drifting as his vision faltered, Ori couldn’t help but feel like a meteorite blazing through the sky crash landing in the ocean. His head couldn’t keep itself together. His body felt weightlessly heavy as his gut tried in vain to figure out where it should be going, endlessly rattled by the impossible crossroads where start and stop met. 

Robbed of his vision, his movement, and worst of all, his gut instinct, any decision he made would be a shot in the dark now. Ori tried to clamp his eyes shut, to no avail. Try as he might, his senses remained overloaded to the point of exhaustion. Was the pale green blur in front of him spiraling in circles, or was that his mind playing tricks on him? 

Ori couldn’t even process what he did next, but he could feel what happened next. A dull, throbbing pain in his head. What came after that, he couldn’t recount if he tried.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew!  
> OK, that was a bit rough. Writing suffering is definitely harder than it seems at first glance, and I'm sure I didn't get it totally right on my first try either. As always, any criticism is greatly appreciated.  
> I definitely let myself take some liberties with the interior here after writing that update post, and I think the final result is better for it. With fanfiction, the game's content and the lore surrounding it becomes the medium for me to tell the story, but mediums can evolve and change to fit the needs of the author. I hope you'll agree the changes don't detract nearly as much from the story as what past me must have imagined, no?  
> Speaking of past me, the second-to-last two paragraphs are almost word-for-word ripped from the previous version of the chapter, with some changes to fit the new scenario. I loved the imagery and the idea, and most of the inspiration for starting from scratch came from wanting to give them the proper setup they deserved instead of being bundled along with a bunch of quasi-related stuff and giant, unwieldy shifts in tone. The concept of Bash(especially executing consecutive Bashes) being jarring to use at first definitely piqued my interest five weeks ago. Seems to be a trend starting with Double Jump, ha ha.  
> As usual, thanks for reading, and special thanks for being patient after I threw any semblance of a reasonable upload schedule away. I'll be leaving the notice up for a few days for anyone in need of context, and then it's getting taken down. (Maybe it could go in a chapter notes somewhere if it needs to?) Have a nice day!


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